The Arkansaw traveler., 1887-12-17
WHY PEOPLE BECOME BALD.
London stanaar,a.

object of the British Pathological as- sOciation to trace the loss of hair to its true causes, to investigate the se- crets of nature and to learn the psy- chological actions of remedies that would benefit and assist nature to re- pair disordered functions. Out of seventeen thousand men upon the "Medical Register" he believed that scarcely twenty had made special study of the hair. Hair falling might be induced by one cause only, or by several acting together or in success sion, as facilitating influences, nerve troubles, excitement, care, worry, blood diseases, hereditary predisposi- tion, occupation, climate, mechanical obstruction, mental emotion, bad ven- tilation, high temperature, vegetoid plaints and animal parasites. The cause of badness was not in the hair shaft, but in the faulty function of nutrition, and although there were in this country some fifty thousand so- called hair- -dressers, their treatment had proved practically impotent to arrest or modify the progress of bald- ness. The association was endeavor- ing to establish a hospital for the treatment of hair diseases with staff of trichologists and periodical lectures and demonstrations, and 1t behooved them to impress upon the nation the advisability of giving the association starter, and compelling every tri- chologist to pass an examination be- fore being allowed to practice.
 The habit of keeping the hair dry and free from some kind of grease to assist the depressed powers of the hair was to his mind source of a great deal of badness. Out of three hun dred and eighty subjects between the ages of twenty five and fifty, who had passed under his observation, ninety two were either bald or getting 80, and the curious fact was brought to light that sixty-one out of the ninety two were wine-drinkcrs.
 In fifty habitual spirit drinkers, men of similar ages, he found seven partly bald and eleven quite bald. Among total abstainers, on the other hand, he found nine partly bald and seven totally bald out of fifty. After obtaining these statistics he took note of fifty "beer- r-drinking drunkards," the investigation resulting in the dis covery that five were partly bald and four quite bald. It was only fair, however, to add that the spirit drink CTS were well-to-do, while the beer drinking drunkards belonged 10 the very poorest classes.
 On another occasion he made notes of one hundred and forty bald persons of mixed classes and of various ages. This showed that forty seven wore full boards, forty-threc shaved nearly the whole face, forty-one shaved only the chin and nine shaved only the mustache, thus showing that the beard had little to do with badness as cause. In his own experience since 1879, when this matter began to espe- cially engage attention, he was not able to demonstrate conclusively the transmission of any special fungus or parasite from lower animals to man or woman in this excessive hair falling and badness.
 He had never been in a position to do this experimentally, yet his convic- ticn was that the dog and the cat were often the cause of some hair loss and trichologists should study and test the question when they had an opportu- nity of witnessing the commencement of extensive hair falling, when no other cause could with a certainty be proved or even assigned for 1t. It was becoming an increased belief that dogs | were subject to some unknown disease which caused badness to human be- 1 ings. Cases of this kind had been brought within his view, and had in- duced him to give good deal of at tention 10 the subject.
 In one instance, Mir. Wheeler said, gentleman-an artist--had a large black retriever dog whose coat had suddenly become gray, in fact almost white, and it was being shed in such large quantities that he could not be had in the house without every thing he touched being covered with hairs. This gentleman had beautiful head of hair when he first spoke about the dog, but when he came again the next year he was quite bald. He also said that the female servant that attended the dog had lost nearly the whole of her hair.
 For himself, he was convinced that the continuous electric current was the most active and efficient hair stim- ulant of the day. It was remedy of great therapeutic value when used as an accessory to other remedies.